Who cares about the top 10 news stories of 2009? The year is gone and forgotten. What’s really important is the top 10 news stories of 2010, so let’s get right to it without actually waiting for the events to occur.

1. The Island County commissioners, facing another budget crisis, lay off the entire Sheriff’s Department, except for Sheriff Mark Brown. To assure adequate coverage of both islands, they buy him a Batmobile.

2. The Oak Harbor City Council makes Highway 20 northbound one-way southbound inside the city limits, and Highway 20 southbound one-way northbound inside the city limits, assuring that visitors can never leave.

3. Coupeville adopts a historical dress code for pioneer farm families, requiring rubber boots and bib overalls whenever they venture outside their historical homes.

4. WSU Extension receives more funding from the Island County Commissioners to create a new volunteer group called Felon Watchers. Using binoculars and field manuals they identify and track felons, relaying the information to Sheriff Brown’s Batmobile.

5. Whidbey Island’s chambers of commerce notice that no festival is scheduled for the second weekend of January and they can’t think of a reason to have one, so they declare Whatever Days!

6. A teenager is seen reading a newspaper on Island Transit, and becomes the laughingstock of the island.

7. Sheriff Brown demands an assistant, so the commissioners debate which of them should wear the Robin costume after hours.

8. The Washington State Legislature, facing another budget crisis, gives San Juan County and Island County to North Korea which, sadly, was the only country willing to take them.

9. Kim Il Sung, illustrious leader of the Peoples Republic of Island County, fires the county commissioners, but keeps the sheriff because of his cool Batmobile.

10. Island County demands more federal assistance, otherwise it will build a nuclear bomb. Finally, the budget crisis is solved.